2 Kings 19:14 - Exposition

And Hezekiah received the letter. It had not been previously stated that Sennacherib had written a letter. But the author forgets this, and so speaks of "the letter." Kings generally communicated by letters, and not merely by messages (see 2 Kings 5:5 ; 2 Kings 20:12 ; 2 Chronicles 2:11 ; Nehemiah 1:9 , etc.). Of the hand of the messengers, and read it. Probably Sennacherib had caused it to be written in Hebrew. And Hezekiah went up into the house of the Lord, and spread it before the Lord. Not as if God would not otherwise know the contents of the letter, but to emphasize his detestation of the letter, and to make it silently plead for him with God. Ewald rightly compares what Judas Maccabaeus did with the disfigured copies of the Law at Maspha (1 Mace. 3:48), but incorrectly calls it "a laying down of the object in the sanctuary ." Maspha was "over against" the temple, at the distance of a mile or more.